106 Va. 851 | Va. | 1907
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This writ of error is to a judgment of the Corporation Court ■of Danville, convicting the plaintiff in error, Albert Watts, of
The prosecution was had under section 128 of the Tax Bill, which reads: “Any person who hires or contracts with laborers, male or female, to be employed by persons other than himself, shall be deemed to be a labor agent; and no person shall engage in such business without having first obtained a license therefor. Every person who shall without a license conduct business as a labor agent shall pay a fine of not less than one hundred dollars nor more than five hundred dollars.” Appendix, Virginia Code (1904), page 224V.
The following are the agreed facts in the case: The Have Byan Ourtis Construction Company is a corporation chartered under the laws of the state of Ohio, and duly licensed to conduct its business of general contracting in this state. The company is engaged upon construction work for the Southern Bail-way Company’s new double track line in Pittsylvania county. Watts was employed by the company as a day laborer on its work, and rendered such service as was required of him, including the manual labor commonly performed by that class of employees on work of similar character. The exigencies of the operation demanding additional labor, Watts was sent to Dan-ville by his employer to secure it. He had succeeded in hiring several laborers for the company, and was endeavoring to induce others to enter its service when he was arrested, prosecuted and convicted of an alleged violation of section 128, supra.
It thus appears that the single question presented by the-record for our determination is whether or not the plaintiff in-error was engaged in the business of a labor agent within the meaning of the foregoing statute, it being admitted that he had no license.
We have no difficulty in resolving that question in the negative. Indeed, it would seem clear that nothing more can be predicated of the transaction than that it constituted a hiring of
The differentiating features between the two transactions of hiring laborers by labor agents and by one’s own agent may be illustrated by the instances of a purchase of real estate through a real estate agent, whose business it is to negotiate sales for anyone who may choose to engaged his services, with whom and his patron no other contractual relation exists, on the one hand, and a purchase by a principal, through his own private agent, on the other. From the former the state exacts a license, but not from the latter. In our opinion the statute in question is plainly not susceptible of the interpretation placed upon it by the trial court; but even if it were of doubtful import, being
For these reasons the judgment must he reversed.
Reversed.